The first casualty in the battle for Hawai’i (see this post) has arrived. No, it’s not an airline going away (yet), but it does involve nice looking airplanes.

According to an article in ATW, go’s $19 one way fares have made Island Air change their minds about this whole expansion thing. The one Q400 they already received will be returned and the other two will not be taken up.

It sounds to me like they’re just using go’s fares as an excuse. They had originally acquired these larger aircraft to compete head to head with Aloha and Hawaiian on routes like Kahului (Maui) to Honolulu. They had fewer flights than the big guys and they were flying props. Even though I love flying on props in the islands, most people gravitate toward jets.

Either way, it’s the end of their grand experiment. My guess is that they will shrink back to their roots, connecting smaller island airports like Kapalua (Maui) to the bigger cities.

The Hawaiian airline market is an interesting place. You put three airlines in the islands and everybody’s happy, but you add a fourth and it all goes crazy.

That’s right, it’s time to break out the steel cage for another round of the Hawaiian brawl.

When go! started flying, it angered a lot of the incumbent airlines because it slashed fares to an unsustainable level and publicly said that it didn’t care if it didn’t make a profit.

If that’s not good enough, Hawaiian Air sued them saying that when they were in bankruptcy, go! used the opportunity to see private documents and then turned around and used them against the airline to start up a competing one. Oh, and it gets worse. Now they say they’ve got an email between the head of go! and a consultant saying that the business plan only works if they can push Aloha out of business.

Definitely not the best way to make friends here.

So, a bunch of airline employees from the other three big airlines in Hawai’i put together a coalition called H.E.R.O - Hawaii’s airline Employees Repelling Ornstein. You guessed it - Ornstein runs go! and it’s parent Mesa Air Group.

Now, Jonathan Ornstein has never shied away from a fight. So how does he respond? Well, with a HERO sale, of course. The airline is offering a ridiculous $19 one way HERO fare between the islands.

This is great. Since that last BWIA brawl fizzled out, I’m glad we have something else to watch now.